1. Technical Field
The invention relates to electronic messaging. More particularly, the invention relates to a redundant email address detection and capture system.
2. Description of the Prior Art
Electronic messaging systems;, such as email, are now commonly accepted and in widespread use. While such systems are provided to facilitate the exchange of information between parties desiring such intercourse, many interlopers exploit the openness of these systems to send spurious messages of a commercial or harassing nature. Such messages are commonly referred to as “spam” (see, for example, S. Michel, When marketing becomes spam, New Media Age, 20 (Nov. 30, 2000). The volume of spam is so great that, in many cases, one has to wade through dozens of worthless messages and systems administrators are often confronted with excessive demands on system capacity and throughput just to process spam.
Some approaches to solving the problem of receiving unsolicited and unwanted messages include the following:
Techniques for Eliminating Redundant Access Checking By Access Filters, U.S. Pat. No. 6,105,027; Distribution Limiter for Network Messaging, U.S. Pat. No. 6,073,167; Inappropriate Site Management Software, U.S. Pat. No. 6,065,055; Internet Filtering System for Filtering Data Transferred Over the Internet Utilizing Immediate and Deferred Filtering Actions, U.S. Pat. No. 5,884,033; Block Junk E-mail; PC/Computing; v11, n11, p156 (November 1998); CyberPR Cutting Spam Out of Your Diet With Email Filters; INTERACTIVE PR & MARKETING NEWS; v6, i2 (Jan. 22, 1999); and Simple Software Commands Allow Users to Tame Unwanted Email; PR News; v54, i47 (Nov. 30, 1998).
Such techniques typically involve the use of filters that identify which particular messages are permitted or that are not permitted by checking lists of accepted or forbidden senders and/or subjects. A limitation with this approach is that the lists must be maintained or the filter becomes less effective with time because many ‘spammers’ are sophisticated and often change their identity to thwart such systems. It would therefore be advantage to provide a mechanism for automatically detecting such unwanted messages in real time.